Ellen
About 276,029 American babies have been named Ellen since 1880, most of them around 1951. In 2025 it ranked 1,062nd. About 151,000 Ellens are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 66.
Popularity, 1880–2025
girls named Ellen boys named Ellen
By the numbers
- Total US births
- 276,029
- Estimated living today
- 151,000
- Median age today
- 66
- Peak year
- 1951
- Best rank
- 68th
- Rank in 2025
- 1,062nd
- First recorded
- 1880
- Girls / boys
- 275,284 / 745
How old the living Ellens are
born that year still alive today
Of the 276,029 babies given the name since 1880, about 151,000 are alive — 55 in every hundred. Roughly 6,400 of them are children and 83,000 are 65 or over. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 1959 and half after.
An estimate, not a count. SSA births aged forward through SSA cohort life tables, which know nothing about who left the country or arrived in it — so for a name that mostly came to America rather than being born in it, this is a floor rather than a figure. Where you fall among living Americans.
Where the name comes from
Origin Ancient Greek
Medieval English variant of Helen, from Ancient Greek Ἑλένη; also used as a variant of Eleanor or a feminine counterpart to Elliot.
Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Notable Ellens
- Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (born 1938)24th president of Liberia
- Ellen DeGeneres (born 1958)American comedian, television host, actress, and writer
- Ellen Burstyn (born 1932)American actress
- Ellen G. White (1827–1915)American author, co-founder of the Seventh-day Adventist Church
- Ellen Pompeo (born 1969)American actress
- Ellen Barkin (born 1954)American actress
- Ellen Key (1849–1926)Swedish writer
- Ellen Terry (1847–1928)English actress
People named Ellen with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).
Where Ellen is most common
Relative to how many babies each state records, Ellen is most concentrated in Massachusetts (2.1×), the District of Columbia (1.9×), New York (1.9×), Connecticut (1.6×).
Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.
Names of 1951
The most popular girls’ names the year Ellen peaked:
Ellen elsewhere
| Country | Spelling | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Norway girls | Ellen | 11,759 | 15th |
| Sweden girls | Ellen | 11,729 | 21st |
| England and Wales girls | Ellen | 8,819 | 63rd |
| Ireland girls | Ellen | 8,391 | 27th |
| Denmark girls | Ellen | 3,665 | 19th |
| Belgium girls | Ellen | 2,630 | 13th |
| Northern Ireland girls | Ellen | 1,405 | 23rd |
| Scotland girls | Ellen | 1,270 | 84th |
| France girls | Ellen | 1,190 | 891st |
| Switzerland girls | Ellen | 394 | 282nd |
| New Zealand girls | Ellen | 124 | 84th |
| Poland girls | Ellen | 56 birth registrations | 378th |
| France boys | Ellen | 5 | 858th |
Counts come from each country's own records and are not comparable with the US figures above, which cover different years and a different definition of a recorded name. Where a country writes the name several ways, the spellings are added together and the most common is shown. A row marked name registrations is counting something else: Portugal ranks each of a child's two given names separately, so a girl registered Maria Leonor is in both the Maria row and the Leonor row, and that figure is not a number of children.
Ellen: births by region
| Region | Country | Spelling | Births | Share of the region | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| German girls | Switzerland | Ellen | 349 | 0.028% | 214th |
| French girls | Switzerland | Ellen | 38 | 0.009% | 336th |
| Italian girls | Switzerland | Ellen | 7 | 0.011% | 116th |
Parts of a country counted above, not extra births. The share is what makes the regions comparable: they differ in size by a factor of three hundred.
By canton, Ellen is most concentrated in Aargau, where 0.03% of children were given it – 43 of them.
Ellen: rank by region
In 2025, Ellen was given 5 times or more in 1 region of Belgium.
| Region | Spelling | Place | Children |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flanders | Ellen | 753 | 6 |
In 2023, Ellen was among the 10 most common names in 1 region of Italy.
| Region | Spelling | Place | Children |
|---|---|---|---|
| Valle d'Aosta/Vallée d'Aoste | Ellen | 8 | 1 |
In 2018, with the country taken in 11 areas rather than 3, Ellen appears in the lists for Province of East Flanders (232nd).
Each of these is the top of a list the statistics office cut off somewhere – Belgium below 5 children, Italy after 10 names – and published nothing after. So a region missing here is one where the name fell outside what was published, not one where it went unused. Places are shared where names tie, and the further down a list a place is, the more names can share it.
Ellen by city
| City | Years | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Berlin girls | 2017–2023 | 46 | 192nd |
One city over a few years, so these are much smaller numbers than the national ones above and not comparable with them.
Ellen among the living
How many people each country's register counts under the name, rather than how many were given it in any one year. Each register was read on one date, and they are not the same date.
| Country | Spelling | First forename | Any forename |
|---|---|---|---|
| the Netherlands girls | Ellen | 17,143 | 22,417 |
| Finland girls | Ellen | 5,539 | 13,614 |
| the Netherlands boys | Ellen | — | 116 |
A count of people on a register – the Netherlands on 1 January 2018, Finland on 4 August 2026 – and not of births, so it cannot be compared with the figures above. Names with very few bearers are withheld, and a dash in the first-forename column means the register would not say rather than that nobody goes by it.
Where Ellen lives in Spain
Not a count of births but of people: 355 women called Ellen were living in Spain on 1 January 2025, of every age, born in any year. Where they live is not spread evenly.
Women: the provinces where it is densest
| Province | Spelling | People | Per thousand | Place there |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alicante/Alacant | Ellen | 48 | 0.047 | 1,394 |
| Balears, Illes | Ellen | 27 | 0.043 | 1,437 |
| Málaga | Ellen | 31 | 0.034 | 1,494 |
| Santa Cruz de Tenerife | Ellen | 18 | 0.032 | 2,136 |
| Girona | Ellen | 10 | 0.024 | 2,030 |
| Barcelona | Ellen | 69 | 0.023 | 2,036 |
Listed in 12 of Spain's 52 provinces. In the other 40 it is either held by fewer than 5 people – the point below which the source withholds a name – or it fell past the 5,000 names the source will print for one province. Neither means nobody there is called it. The rate is the source's own, not a share worked out here.
Related names
Ellen against another name
Two names on one chart, with the year one overtook the other.
Try it on yourself
Source: US Social Security Administration, national and state baby-name files, 1880–2025. Counts include only births registered with the SSA, and names with fewer than five births in a year are not published. The living estimate applies SSA cohort life tables to those births; it counts people born in the United States, so it misses anyone who arrived later and anyone who has left.